On Thursday, 03 December 1998 at 08:43, Helge Hafting wrote:> > Roeland Th. Jans wrote:> > On Wed, Dec 02, 1998 at 03:25:24PM -0000, Simon Kenyon wrote:> > > On 02-Dec-98 Alex Buell wrote:> > > > What is the first thing that ceases when you spin down a planet? That's> > > > right, gravity. Everything not tied down would just fly out into space,> > > > and that includes the atmosphere. Simple. > > > > > > i don't see a smiley, but i have to assume that that was a little joke! right?> > > > well, the problem is that... it's true. so don't use ower management on the> > earth spin...> > Where do people get such crazy ideas?> Earth's gravity has nothing to do with spin, but mass. The mass creates> the gravity. The spin creates a centrifugal force that's opposed> to gravity, it weakens the effect of gravity slightly.> > Stopping the spin wouldn't mess up gravity at all. There would> be other unpleasant effects like making a day half a year long,> turning one side of the planet into desert and freezing the other.

Really? I thought if spin were stopped then days would be eternal on one side of the planetand nights on the other... I guess it depends on whether your frame of reference is the Sun or some grid arbitrarily laid out on the solar system.-- Brendan Cullybrendan@kublai.com`cat ~/.signature`

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